


Charcoal

by ungoodpirate



Series: Art Lovers [2]
Category: Glee
Genre: Alternate Universe, M/M, art student!Blaine, art thief!Kurt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-02-11
Updated: 2015-02-11
Packaged: 2018-03-11 22:21:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,371
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3334883
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ungoodpirate/pseuds/ungoodpirate
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"I need place to lie low for bit." </p><p>"Of course," Blaine says, like harboring a bruised up art thief is an ‘of course’ kind of situation.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Charcoal

“Hope you don’t mind I let myself in,” says a dim, familiar voice from the corner of the room. It would have made Blaine jump if he hadn’t spent every day of the last five months hoping for the person whom the voice belonged to return.

Blaine flicks on the light and Kurt flinches under the glow. He has a split lip and a bruise around one eye.

“Shit,” Blaine says.

Kurt waves off the concern even as he sat slumped in the chair, one arm curled around his middle.

“You okay?” Blaine asks. If he knew Kurt better than the best one night stand of his life, he’d rush to his side. Instead his feet are glued to the floor.

“In my line of business,” Kurt says, “There’s a lot of the money on the line. Sometimes people screw each other over, and sometimes people aren’t too happy about it, and sometimes I get stuck in the middle of all that...” He huffs a sigh in annoyance of it all. “Look, I’m fine. I just need a place to lie low and heal up for a little bit. I was hoping that could be here.”

“Yeah,” Blaine says. “Of course.” Like harboring a bruised up art thief is an ‘of course’ kind of situation.

Kurt grins, eyes going crinkly around the corners. “Knew I could count on you. You like living a little dangerously, don’t you, Blaine?”

Blaine’s face heats up.  He turns toward the kitchen, clears his throat. “Do you need anything? Water?”

“An icepack would be nice. And something stronger than water.”

Blaine wraps an icepack in a dishtowel and mixes up two rum and cokes. He pulls a seat up next to Kurt.

Kurt presses the icepack over the darkened eye. “Thanks… I’d thank you properly, but I’m a little ache-y right now.”

The blush Blaine fought down in the kitchen flares back up. “You don’t have to do that.”

“I know,” Kurt says, smirking. “But I want to.”

Blaine downs half of his drink, tugs straight his jeans at his knees, then peaks at Kurt when he’s off guard – mouth downturned and wincing when he raises his arm to lift his glass for a drink.

Kurt catches him staring. “What?”

“I’m glad to see you again,” Blaine says.

A crease forms between Kurt’s eyebrows as he observes Blaine in a way he hadn’t before.

“Yeah,” he says. “Me too.”

…

Blaine savors the warmth of a body next to him as he drifts slowly awake. It’s the second half of the experience he hadn’t gotten the first time Kurt spent the night.

When Blaine finally pulls his eyelids open, he spies Kurt leaning up against the headboard, flipping through Blaine’s sketchbook. Blaine sits up fast. People always think they can look through an artist’s sketchbook, not realizing it’s like looking through someone’s diary.

“These are good,” Kurt comments, flipping from a bowl of fruit to a pair of hands. “Typical art school subject matter, but the technique is strong.” He glances sideways at Blaine. “I might be stealing one of your pieces one day.”

“That’s a compliment?”

“I only steal the best,” Kurt says. He turns the next page over; Blaine swallows as he watches Kurt’s expression only, watches his casual eyes intensify.

“This supposed to be me?” He tilts the sketchbook towards Blaine, but Blaine doesn’t have to look. He knows what’s on the page. He agonized over that drawing for weeks, adding and tweaking little details as he aimed to recreate the image of the man now sitting beside him: the shape of his eyebrows, length of his fingers, the wisps of his hair brushed up from his scalp.

“It – it was from memory,” Blaine says, rubbing at the back of his neck. Oh, and ugh, he probably has a bushy tangle of sleep curls right now.

“It’s very flattering,” Kurt says. He lays it flat on his lap. “Do you have a boyfriend?”

Blaine shakes his head.

“Why not?... Sorry, that sounds like a nosy aunt at Christmas. But, I mean, you’re cute. You’re sweet. I can’t see why not.”

“Well, there is this guy,” Blaine says and bites his lip as his heart thumps though it quite clear what guy he’s referring to.

“A guy, huh?” Kurt teases, clearly in the game.

Blaine nods, leaning in. “Yeah, he’s really good looking, and mysterious.”

Kurt tilts back his head and laughs. You could forget that he’s injured, looking so alive like that. He inches a finger at Blaine, saying, “Come here, you.” Blaine does, until they’re so close that they’re kissing.

Blaine’s careful not to lean his weight on Kurt. He spied the blooming bruise on his side when he changed into borrowed pajamas last night. Doesn’t mean he doesn’t want more, though. So he trails his kisses down Kurt’s neck and collar bone as he reaches to thumb down the elastic band of Kurt’s boxer shorts. Kurt had carefully set aside the sketchbook earlier, bless him.

He goes down on Kurt, Kurt taking no bother to be quite and scratching his fingers through Blaine’s hair.

“Christ,” he says in a half-breathe after they’re done. “I should’ve come back sooner.”

It’s lilted like a joke, like a flirt, and Blaine’s too clogged up to banter back _Yeah, you should’ve_ like it’s less than the absolute truth.

…

Blaine goes to class and comes back to class to find Kurt sprawled out on the couch watching HGTV. He stands right inside the apartment door, blinking as he tried to discern if this is a mirage.

“What?” Kurt asks, not even looking, making Blaine jerk guiltily.

Kurt tucks his head down over the armrest, stares at Blaine upside. “I’m a thief. I’m always aware of my surroundings.”

Blaine shucks his satchel and sits on the couch by Kurt’s feet. Kurt draws up his legs to create space.

“I was convinced you weren’t going to be here when I got back,” Blaine admits.

“I’m not going anywhere for a while,” Kurt says. “Unless you want me to leave.”

“I don’t,” says Blaine quickly. He clears his throat.

The _Property Brothers_ play until commercials, and Kurt asks, “Why art?”

Blaine’s still trying to piece together the question, distracted by Kurt’s sock-covered toes pressed beside his thigh, when Kurt goes on. “Sorry. That’s another one that sounds like the nosy aunt. I’m just curious. I’m on the other side of things. I know why people want art, just not why they make it. At least not an insider’s view.”

“I’m not sure I can speak for all artists,” Blaine says, a purposefully political non-answer.

“Speak for you.”

Blaine rolls his head like working out a sore neck. “I like… I like the idea of creating something.” Because he knows what’s it like to be destroyed and torn apart, personally and publically, to have those pieces of yourself stomped on. He knows what it’s like to a victim of hate. Art, for him, is the opposite of all that.

“Creation,” Kurt repeats, humming over the word. “I like that. It’s pure.”

Blaine huffs. “Okay then. Why theft?”

“Way to pay the bills,” Kurt says.

“There are legal ways to do that.”

“Semantics,” Kurt replies. The show comes back on. Kurt mutes it.  “It’s a long story with a slow decent into criminal activity.”

“You said you were going to be here for a while.” It’s a dare. They have the time and Blaine’s willing to listen. He wants, indeed, a bigger piece of Kurt: his past, his secrets, his confidence.

Kurt pulls himself up to sitting with a grunt. Barely any gap between them, he reaches over, gripping Blaine’s belt buckle. “I owe someone a blow job.”

“You don’t owe me anything,” Blaine insists. As much as he’s turned on by Kurt – now, last night, in every wet dream and shower fantasy since their first meeting – he doesn’t want it like rent owed.

“I know,” Kurt says, undoing the buckle with sure fingers. “But I want to.”

…

The fall into an easy cycle the next few days, of flirting and fooling around in ways that didn’t exasperate Kurt’s injuries and eating meals together and commentating on TV shows. Kurt bruises start to ease from purple to yellow, and it’s reminder about how impermanent the arrangement is. Several times, coming out from the bathroom or back from class or work, he’s caught Kurt frowning at his phone, maybe typing aggressively. He tucks it away as soon as Blaine enters.

When Blaine dares to ask, “Who’s that?” Kurt provides a tinny grin and replies, “Work stuff.”

One afternoon, Blaine comes back after class and a shift at the campus coffee shop – thank god his parents are bankrolling tuition and rent – to find his apartment vacant of Kurt. He calls out his name, bangs on the bathroom door, checks the bedroom, and ends up sliding half down the doorframe.

The front door opens, closes, and Kurt’s in the front hall. “Hey,” he says.

Blaine straightens up. “Where were you?”

Kurt raises an eyebrow at Blaine’s raised tone, then lifts up some plastic bags. “Groceries. Wanted to test out my ribs on a proper walk. What’s up with you?”

Blaine follows Kurt into the kitchen, where Kurt starts sorting out his purchases and putting them into the correct cabinets.

“I – I thought you left,” Blaine says. “I thought you left again without saying goodbye.”

Kurt pauses with a box of corn flakes in hand. “You know I’m going to leave eventually, right?”

“I know,” Blaine says, though it’s sour and it makes him want to punch a wall. “Just don’t leave without saying goodbye for real this time. Please.”

Kurt sets the box on the counter, turns around, grips the edge. “I can’t promise that.”

Blaine mouth and heart drop in betrayal, but Kurt cuts across with an explanation before Blaine can sputter out his damaged heart.

“I’m like this,” Kurt says, motioning at his still puffy eye, “Because I got in a bad way with some rough people. I wouldn’t have come here unless I was a hundred percent sure there was no risk to you. But if there comes a time I have to leave, no notice, because it’s the only way to protect you from my shit, and it is my shit, then I will.”

 Blaine stares at the wall clock over Kurt’s head and can’t even read what time it is, water blurring his vision. He closes his eyelids for a couple breathes, until he can talk again without spilling over.

“Then please,” he says, finally opening up to the vision of Kurt with white knuckles on the counter edge and his own bottom lip bit in. “If you can, say goodbye.”

It should be a weight lifted but it’s a weight added instead, because Kurt leaving, goodbye or no, was going to knock Blaine down at the knees then punch him in the gut. His heart was set on Kurt, and that’s all there was to it.

…

Pillow-talking that night, Kurt says, “You never asked me if I had a boyfriend.”

Blaine plays along. “Do you?”

Kurt’s finger traces the shell of Blaine’s ear. “No,” he says. “My profession doesn’t really leave room for settling down.”

Blaine hmms.

“But,” Kurt’s finger drops down behind Blaine’s ear onto his pulse point. “There’s this guy… he’s a talented artist. Really cute, really sweet. The only problem is...” he presses his lips now to the spot behind Blaine’s ear, whispers, “I can’t ask him to wait around for me.”

“Kurt,” Blaine says like the sound of breaking glass, because he would wait, if Kurt asked him, if Kurt promised to come back, but he won’t promise. He won’t promise a thing.

“It sucks too,” Kurt goes on, free hand coming up to clutch Blaine’s wrist. “Because it’s so obvious that he has so much love to give.”

Fuck it. A tear escapes. Blaine had been fighting it all day.

…

“Can I draw you?”

Kurt clicks down the volume on the TV. “Sure, I’m not going anywhere anytime soon.” 

It’s a lie. His split lip is healed, the black eye is only visible in subtle discoloration if you’re staring for it, and they had quite acrobatic sex this morning. Kurt could be leaving at anytime. That’s why Blaine asks.

He sits on the opposite end of the couch, on the arm, feet on the cushions, propping his sketchbook on his knees. He uses charcoal this time. It’s darker than pencil and messier. His fingertips get covered in it as his smudges in the perfect shading.

He takes his time striking down each line and observing Kurt in between. Kurt glances at Blaine every so often, perhaps self-conscious. Blaine draws the act out, like it’s his last anchor. He has nothing else to hold Kurt here.

“Can I see?” Kurt asks when he’s finished, and Blaine hands it over. The drawing is Kurt in perfect profile. Blaine thinks he was able to catch a little more personality this time, a little more of that inner reality.

Kurt stares at it for a long time. When he hands it back, he says, “I’ll really miss you.”

…

Blaine was right to get his drawing in when he did. It’s the next day Kurt announces he’s leaving.

 “When?” Blaine asks.

“Now.”

Blaine doesn’t say _stay_ , doesn’t say _don’t go._ He doesn’t plead a single thing, swallows them all down, grits his teeth and nods. This had always been the ending.

Kurt wraps Blaine in hug. Perhaps Blaine lifted his arms first; he’s not sure except for now Kurt’s cheek is pressed against his own. Blaine tucks in his head and tries to memorize Kurt’s smell. He had memorialized his visage in the sketchpad, but what of the rest of Kurt: the exact warmth of him through his clothes, the smooth of his skin, the musical quality of his voice…?

 “Thank you for everything,” Kurt says, and kisses him. Memorize this too, the lingering taste of his lips.

Then he was gone like air. Blaine never really had a chance to hold onto him. The shutting of the front door is a sharp period on all of it. Goodbye.


End file.
